9.5.2

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XPRESSO EDITOR • 1095
 Last On This Level: References the last element on the same hierarchical
level.
 First In Scene: Chooses the rst object in the scene.
 Last In Scene: Jumps to the scene’s last element.
Start Distance
With some Start Position modes, you might want to jump several steps in the hierarchy in one go.
In such cases, use Start Distance as a multiplier for the Start Position. For example, to reference
an object that is three positions after the object that owns the XPresso tag, set Start Position to
Successor On This Level and set Start Distance to 3.
Path
This box is available only when Relative Mode is set to Relative Reference. Use the box to enter the
path for the relative reference. For example, the path ‘UPPDN’ stands for ‘Up, Previous, Previous,
Down, Next’, where Previous and Next represent a jump to the previous or next element on the same
hierarchical level. See also ‘Relative Reference’, above.
History Depth
The Object node gives you access to all of the element’s parameters via ports. Choose the desired ports
from the node’s inputs menu and outputs menu (the blue and red squares). For example, you can use
an Object node to output an object’s global matrix, velocity, position, scale or rotation.
In addition, you can access the object’s previous states via ports such as Previous Global Matrix. The
History Depth value determines how many previous states the node stores. To recall a previous state
,add a History Level port to the node via the inputs menu and, in the Attribute manager, enter a
number for how many states back you want to go. For example, a value of 3 retrieves the third last
state.
Inputs and outputs
Each object node has various input and output ports depending on which type of object or tag the
node represents. Ports on the left side of the node are input ports — they pass data to the object,
material or tag. Ports on the right side are output ports and pass the data on to one or more other
nodes.
Most of these ports correspond to object, tag or material attributes and are described in the relevant
chapters in this manual. The remaining ports are described below. Note that some of these ports are
available to object nodes only — not to materials or tags. Also, some of these ports are available as
inputs only or as outputs only.